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Rhythms 45
I’m used to just rocking up with a guitar and a little suitcase, now I’ve got an amp
and two guitars and a pedal-board and I’m always whinging about how much
work lugging it all is. Nick’s loving seeing me struggle with gear because it’s
usually him.”
While the band covers a lot of different musical terrain over the course of I Must
Be Somewhere, this wasn’t necessarily what they had in mind when they set out
on the creative voyage.
“It wasn’t really conscious, but it became apparent as we were putting it together
that it wasn’t so linear in style,” Sinclair tells. “We liked that about it though.
The last song on there, ‘By Now’, actually surprised me – and I wasn’t even sure
if I wanted to put it on the record – but our producer Shane O’Mara liked it,
and he made some suggestions about what instruments we could use on it to
take it away from the original Mumford & Sons-esque folk-pop vibe. He made
some tweaks to it and it ended up sounding a bit more like ‘90s Paul Simon or
something like that, which I really dug. That track scared me a little bit because it
seemed like it was so far away from our sound, but now I really like it.
“And I guess ‘Shape & Line’ was a
fair way away from our sound too,
and I was a bit concerned that people
were going to think that that’s what
the whole record sounded like, but I
think there’s enough on there that it
still sounds like us, or what people
who were into the band liked about us
initially.
“But it wasn’t a conscious decision as
in, ‘Let’s make an album that sounds
this way or that way,’ we just all bring
songs into the room and if people like
them then we work on them. Then
before we knew it we had ten songs
and went, ‘Let’s record ‘em!’”
Fortunately, at a stage when it seemed
that there might be a shortfall of
material to complete the band’s
obligation for the record – following
a request from their record label –
guitarist/vocalist O’Mara stepped
up to the plate with some strong
fully-formed songs, tracks which
complement the Sinclair-penned
numbers perfectly.
“Yeah, Nick brought in three songs
this time which was handy because
we usually make eight-track albums,”
Sinclair explains. “I’ve always liked
keeping it really concise. I’m usually
bored after half an hour, I like a short,
sharp album where every song is really
strong rather than a longer album
where a couple of songs are a bit shit
and make you lose concentration.
But [our label] ABC Music steered us
towards doing ten songs, and luckily
Nick had some really strong songs
ready to go.
“He’s got three on there, and he also
sent me some music that was fully-
formed – the structure and everything
was already there, we just did some
minor tweaks to it – and that became
the track ‘Everyday, Everyday’. I really
enjoyed that way of working. He sent
me that just as a piece of music and
said, ‘Have a crack at putting some
words to this,’ and that was a really
nice way to work.
“We haven’t done that before, but I
reckon we’ll do it again, because Nick
loves to write music – that’s his thing.
I mean he’s a really great songwriter
too, but he teaches music and he’s
really good at putting it together
without having lyrics, whereas I need
to do it both at the same time. So he
sent me that and it was really good
being led musically – or led into the
lyrics – by the music. So there was a lot
more of that stuff going on, and I think
the band’s stronger for it.”
i Must Be Somewhere is available
through ABC.
STEVE BELL